


guilty

by golden_goose



Category: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Genre: Animal Death, Gen, Substance Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-27
Updated: 2017-03-27
Packaged: 2018-10-11 13:15:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10465890
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/golden_goose/pseuds/golden_goose





	

Dennis never liked animals. Frank couldn't stand them, and he forbid both Dee and Dennis from keeping pets. His mother had dogs that she doted on more than her own children, little chihuahuas: Paco and Chico. Barbara would buy them filet dinners and designer collars on the days she felt like getting out of bed. On the days she was hopped up on pills, the little shits would run free through the house. Invariably, they ended chewing on Dennis's stuff, wrecking it, pissing on it. He knew they got to some of Dee's things too; he saw one of them go into her room, and heard her screaming bloody murder later that night.

The final straw came when Dennis walked into his bedroom after school to find Paco chewing a hole in his file of notes on Dee. He felt a white hot fury, the overwhelming kind that took him out of his body. He kicked the dog, ended up breaking one of its skinny little legs. Of course, his mother was furious, and she took it out on both Dennis and his sister, grounding them both for a month and making them scrub the house top to bottom.

The two of them were in the midst of scrubbing Barbara’s vomit off the floor of the master bathroom when Dee suggested a solution for the dog problem. 

“Why don't we just kill them?”, she said, like it was the reasonable thing in the world.

To be completely honest, Dennis had considered the same thing. He'd even spent an afternoon at his school’s library looking up things poisonous to dogs. Still, he was surprised that Dee was bold enough to bring it up, especially now, so close to where the bed where their mother lay passed out.

He cast a nervous glance towards the door that led to the bedroom, then sat there staring at his sister with his eyes wide.

“Don't worry about her. She's stoned out of her mind.” Dee said, rolling her eyes.

“Yeah,” Dennis replied in a hushed voice.

“Anyway, I know where the rat poison is in the basement. We can put some in their food. C’mon Dennis, think about it. No more dogs, no more ruined clothes, no more stepping in puddles of piss.” 

It didn't take much more coaxing from her for him to agree. The two of them ended up sneaking out of the bedroom. Dee was right; their mom was totally unconscious. She didn't even wake up when Dennis accidentally bumped into the dresser. 

Dennis remembers the smell of the basement that day, a combination of years of dust and mildew, and the way the flashlight batteries died in the middle of their little adventure, causing him to shriek and cling to Dee. The rat poison was on the top shelf and Dee nearly fell off the stepladder trying to reach it. Finally, she came back down carrying a little tin with a dead rat on it. 

“Got it,” she said with a smirk.

Dennis smiled weakly back at her. 

They searched through the cupboards in the kitchen upstairs until they found two cans of dog food to mix the poison into. Dee handed him one of the cans. 

“For Paco.” 

He was surprised when he didn't feel guilt the next morning when he heard his mother crying.


End file.
